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Ferrite.jl

Welcome to the documentation for Ferrite.jl! Ferrite is a finite element toolbox that provides functionalities to implement finite element analysis in Julia. The aim is to be i) general, ii) performant, and iii) to keep mathematical abstractions.

Upgrading code from version 0.3.x to version 1.0

Ferrite version 1.0 contains a number of breaking changes compared to version 0.3.x. The Changelog documents all changes and there is also a section specifically for Upgrading code from Ferrite 0.3 to 1.0.

Note

Please help improve this documentation – if something confuses you, chances are you're not alone. It's easy to do as you read along: just click on the "Edit on GitHub" link at the top of each page, and then edit the files directly in your browser. Your changes will be vetted by developers before becoming permanent, so don't worry about whether you might say something wrong. See also Contributing to Ferrite for more details.

How the documentation is organized

This high level view of the documentation structure will help you find what you are looking for. The document is organized as follows[1]:

  • Tutorials are thoroughly documented examples which guides you through the process of solving partial differential equations using Ferrite.
  • Topic guides contains more in-depth explanations and discussions about finite element programming concepts and ideas, and specifically how these are realized in Ferrite.
  • Reference contains the technical API reference of functions and methods (e.g. the documentation strings).
  • How-to guides will guide you through the steps involved in addressing common tasks and use-cases. These usually build on top of the tutorials and thus assume basic knowledge of how Ferrite works.

The four sections above form the main user-facing parts of the documentation. In addition, the document also contain the following sections:

  • Code gallery contain user contributed example programs showcasing what can be done with Ferrite.
  • Changelog contain release notes and information about how to upgrade between releases.
  • Developer documentation contain documentation of Ferrite internal code and is mainly targeted at developers of Ferrite.

Getting started

As a new user of Ferrite it is suggested to start working with the tutorials before using Ferrite to tackle the specific equation you ultimately want to solve. The tutorials start with explaining the basic concepts and then increase in complexity. Understanding the first tutorial program, solving the heat equation, is essential in order to understand how Ferrite works. Already this rather simple program discusses many of the important concepts. See the tutorials overview for suggestion on how to progress to more advanced usage.

Getting help

If you have questions about Ferrite it is suggested to use the #ferrite-fem channel on the Julia Slack, or the #Ferrite.jl stream on Zulip. Alternatively you can use the discussion forum on the GitHub repository.

Installation

To use Ferrite you first need to install Julia, see https://julialang.org/ for details. Installing Ferrite can then be done from the Pkg REPL; press ] at the julia> promp to enter pkg> mode:

pkg> add Ferrite

This will install Ferrite and all necessary dependencies. Press backspace to get back to the julia> prompt. (See the documentation for Pkg, Julia's package manager, for more help regarding package installation and project management.)

Finally, to load Ferrite, use

using Ferrite

You are now all set to start using Ferrite!

Contributing to Ferrite

Ferrite is still under active development. If you find a bug, or have ideas for improvements, you are encouraged to interact with the developers on the Ferrite GitHub repository. There is also a thorough contributor guide which can be found in CONTRIBUTING.md.